U.S moves to rein in Islamic state group

Security Council adopts resolution that aims to
weaken group that has seized territory in Iraq
and Syria .
The United Nations Security Council has taken a
tough line against the Islamic State group in Iraq
and Syria , blacklisting six people including the
group's spokesman and threatening sanctions
against its financiers and weapons suppliers.
The 15 - member council unanimously adopted on
Friday a resolution that aims to weaken the
Islamic State - an al - Qaeda splinter group that
has seized swaths of territory in Iraq and Syria
and declared a caliphate - and al - Qaeda' s
Syrian wing al - Nusra Front .
The Islamic State , formerly known as the Islamic
State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL ) has long
been blacklisted by the Security Council, while al -
Nusra Front was added earlier this year.
"We have watched in horror their brutal actions, "
said Mark Lyall Grant, UK ambassador to the UN
and presiding officer of the UN council meeting.
"They are deliberately targeting civlians ."
Both groups are designated under the UN al -
Qaeda sanctions regime .
Hours after the resolution was adopted , early
Saturday morning, US warplanes carried out
more air strikes in northern Iraq, according to
the Kurdish news agency Roodaw .
The strikes were on four sites near the Mosul Dam
which is controlled by the Islamic State , witnesses
said .
Friday 's resolution named six people who will be
subject to an international travel ban , asset
freeze and arms embargo . They include Islamic
State spokesman Abu Muhammad al - Adnani , an
Iraqi described by UN experts as one of the
group's "most influential emirs " and close to its
leader Abu Bakr al - Baghdadi.
The Islamic State 's swift and brutal push to the
borders of Iraq' s autonomous ethnic Kurdish
region and towards Baghdad has sparked the
first US air strikes in Iraq since the withdrawal
of American troops in 2011.
The Security Council resolution " deplores and
condemns in the strongest terms the terrorist
acts of ISIL and its violent extremist ideology,
and its continued gross , systematic and
widespread abuses of human rights and violations
of international humanitarian law. "
Individuals blacklisted
The resolution also blacklisted Said Arif, a
former Algerian army officer who escaped house
arrest in France in 2013 and joined al - Nusra
Front in Syria, and Abdul Mohsen Abdallah
Ibrahim al - Charekh of Saudi Arabia, dubbed "a
leading terrorist internet propagandist " who
heads the group in Syria 's Latakia district.
Hamid Hamad Hamid al - Ali and Hajjaj bin
Fahd al - Ajmi , both from Kuwait , were
sanctioned for allegedly providing financial
support to al -Nusra Front - Ajmi 's fundraising
includes at least one Twitter campaign, according
to UN experts - while Abdelrahman Mouhamad
Zafir al - Dabidi al - Jahani of Saudi Arabia was
named because he runs al - Nusra Front 's foreign
fighter networks.
Britain initially aimed to adopt the text by the
end of August , but accelerated its plan after a
surge by the Islamic State , which poses the biggest
threat to Iraq since Saddam Hussein was toppled
by a US - led invasion in 2003.
The resolution condemns the recruitment of
foreign fighters and expresses readiness to
blacklist people financing or facilitating travel of
foreign fighters.
It expresses concern that revenue generated
from oilfields captured by both groups is being
used to organise attacks.
Islamic State fighters are selling oil from
oilfields in Iraq and refineries they control to
local communities and smugglers, augmenting
their existing ample finances , US intelligence
officials said on Thursday.
The resolution condemns any direct or indirect
trade with Islamic State or Nusra Front and
warns such moves could lead to more sanctions .